The new accurate way to measure the world’s wealthiest countries

New World Wealth (NWW), a South Africa-based market research consultancy, released the lists of wealthiest countries, ranked by using its own new method.

The list of richest countries is traditionally measured by using Gross Domestic Product (GDP). But NWW said that GDP method is not accurate as a high GDP is not always related to a high wealth.

According to Forbes, NWW has described factors that promote a country's high wealth that include strong ownership right, a well-developed banking system and stock market, free and independent media, low level of government intervention, low income tax and company tax rates, and ease of investment.

As contained in NWW's new document "The W20 - The Wealthiest Countries in the World", there are six lists of wealthiest countries ranked by different categories.

The first list ranked by "total individual wealth" that refers to the private wealth held by all the individuals in each country. It includes all their net assets including all property, cash, equities and business interests.

In terms of total individual wealth, the United States takes the top rank with total wealth of $48.7 trillion, followed by China with total wealth of $17.3 trillion. Japan is in the third place of wealthiest countries with $15.2 of total wealth followed by Germany ($9,358) and the U.K. ($9,240).

According to The Financial Express, it is not surprising that the U.S. is on the first place on the list.

The U.S. economy is driven by its private entrepreneurs and giant conglomerates. The same principle of entrepreneurship has acted as the driving force of Japanese industrialization. But the Chinese has a different perspective with its socialist principle.

Another NWW's list based on average wealth per person, known as per capita wealth, showed Switzerland on top rank with wealth per capita of $285,100.

The list is followed by Australia ($204,400), U.S. ($150,600), U.K. ($147,600), and Sweden on fifth place with wealth per capita of $146,000.

The NWW also ranks the wealthiest countries based on its growth of wealth per capita from 2000 to 2015.

On the top of the list is Indonesia which has the highest growth of 362%, followed by China with 341% of growth, Russian Federation (253%), Australia (248%), and India (211%).

The report adds the list of wealthy countries that do not make the list of the richest 20 countries because of their low populations.

The list lead by Monaco with wealth per capita of $1,525,000 followed by Liechtenstein ($620,000), Switzerland ($285,100), Australia ($204,400) and Norway ($200,000).

The report focus on Africa showed Mauritius as the wealthiest country with wealth per capita of ($21,710), followed by South Africa ($11,000), and Namibia ($10,520).

While the list focuses on Middle Eastern countries has Qatar on top with $108,290 of wealth per capita followed by United Arab Emirates ($76,470) and Kuwait ($72,590).